North Texas SC Falls 2-1 to Sporting KC II in Interim Coach John Gall’s First Match in
Arlington, TX (July 22, 2023) – North Texas SC (5-9-6, 22 points) conceded two goals in the first half and suffered a 2-1 loss to Sporting KC II (8-5-5, 32 points) at Choctaw Stadium on Saturday night.
GALL DEBUT
Caretaker coach John Gall made his debut as a professional head coach tonight. Gall assumed interim head coaching duties on Monday, July 17, after North Texas SC relieved Javier Cano of his coaching duties. Gall began the season as an assistant coach for North Texas and serves as the FC Dallas Academy Boys’ coaching director.
LEAD THE LINE
Forward José Mulato scored his fourth goal of the 2023 season in the 11th minute. Mulato is now level on points with Hope Aveyevu in the team lead in goals (4), coupled with his three assists. With today’s goal, Mulato now leads North Texas in total seven goal contributions, four goals and three assists in just 12 games overall.
RECORD AT HOME
North Texas SC’s home record for the 2023 season drops to 3-4-3 after suffering a 2-1 loss to Sporting KC II. North Texas has a record of 21-7-14 at Choctaw Stadium since the game started at Arlington in 2020.
RECORD AGAINST SKC II
North Texas SC now holds a 2-2-1 record against Sporting KC II. NTSC has scored nine goals and conceded seven in five games.
NEXT
North Texas SC will host Timbers2 presented by Children’s Health on Saturday, July 29th. The game begins at 7:30 p.m. CT on the MLS Season Pass on Apple TV.
lineups
North Texas SC —Antonio Carrera; Tyshawn Rose, Nolan Norris (Diego Pepi – 86′), Henri Santos, Herbert Endeley; Carl Sainté, André Costa (Alejandro Araneda – 81′), Theo Ferreira (Diego García – 72′); Tomas Pondeca (Yeicar Perlaza – 72′), Jose Mulato (Pablo Torre – 81′), Hope Avayevu.
Substitutes were not used —Michael Webber, Manuel Caicedo, Jared Salazar, Nayrobi Vargas.
Sporting KC II — Ethan Bandre; Lucas Rosa, Nassim Mekideche, Chris Rindov, Enzo Mauriz (Cam Duke – 62′); Jahon Rad, Vitor Dias, Andrew Draper (Alenis Vargas – 62′), Josh Coan (Ethan Bryant – 80′); Keny Martinez (Pau Vidal – 46′), Sebastian Cruz (Ozzie Cisneros – 88′).
Substitutes were not used — Nati Clarke, Michael Lenis, Amadou Traore
Summary of points:
NTX: Jose Mulato (Tyshawn Rose) – 11′
SK C: Sebastian Cruz (Andrew Draper) – 41′
SK C: Josh Coan (penalty) – 45’+2′
Summary of Misconduct:
SK C: Nassim Mekideche (Calling) – 48′
NTX: Henri Santos (Warning) – 51′
SK C: Jahon Rad (caution) – 84′
SK C: Cam Duke (caution) – 90’+3′
Weather: Sunny, 92°F
Participation: 987
Post game quotes
Interim coach John Gall
At the game tonight…
“Football is about putting the ball in the net and they did that tonight and got the win. Overall, you saw a different North Texas team tonight. It was a team with a lot of confidence and a lot of belief in what they were doing. They passed the ball, saved it and made progress when needed. We created a lot of chances in the game but when you concede those few goals at the end of the first half it’s even worse. In the second game we pushed and pushed the game with changes we made. The included subs did a really good job of boosting the intensity. At the end of the day, we’re here to win games. We want to win and everything we do is about winning. Our mentality will keep changing but I’m really proud of the guys because they did their best tonight. We will keep pushing and there is no doubt that this team is on the rise.”
At the Finish…
“We’ve spent a lot of time this week enjoying our football and being more on the ball. We have a lot of good players with talent and high technical ability, we want to use that to our strength. It’s part of Dallas FC’s DNA, we want good players on the ball and we have that and we will continue to use that. It was a great goal from back to front with Jose’s finish. Ultimately, we want to move on. The first 25 minutes was probably the best 25 minutes of the season. We probably could have capitalized on a second goal, but we made a couple of mistakes before half-time. We will continue to work together and interact positively with players to help them play their best.”
To prepare the game for Timbers2…
“We will increase it again compared to last week. Over the past week there have been a lot of introductions to some things we wanted to work on. We saw a lot of things in the game that were positive in training. There will be many more additions to training this week. The desire, the effort and the intensity are there now. We just need to clean up the small details and then we will change that quickly.”
Midfielder Carl Sainte
Thoughts on the game…
“It was a good game but we were unlucky and couldn’t get the result we wanted. We lost to one of the best teams in the league. We still have eight games left in the season and consider them all finals. We had clear scoring chances tonight but we’ll focus on capitalizing on them in the next game.”
About the playing style of the team…
“We worked a lot this week to keep the ball better. Holding the ball longer tends to tire you out and drive your opponents insane. The way we play and build is very important. We have to keep this style until the last games of the season.”
For the last eight games of the season…
“Every game is like a final for us. We’re not aiming for a point or two. We want three points and we want to give 100% to be the best version of ourselves. We will adjust some details during the week so we can get the desired result every weekend.”